Lala’s Gun tells the story of a young boy of the Miao ethnic minority in China. As dictated by tradition, every Miao boy upon reaching the age of fifteen is to receive a gun from his father as a symbol of reaching manhood. Lala, however, has been raised by his grandmother, his mother having died and his father having abandoned the family years earlier. Though promised a gun from the local gunsmith, Lala sets off to other villages in search of a father he never knew.